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Showing posts from February, 2024

Richard III Chicago Shakespeare Theater 2024

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  Richard III by William Shakespeare (William Shakespeare's Hellraiser, photo credit: Liz Lauren)   Ah Richard Plantagenet, Duke of Gloucester, King by his own bloody hand…Whether he deserves it or not, (and a lot of historians say he doesn’t but who asked them?) he has become one of Anglo American culture’s most wicked, and most gleeful villains.   It’s a personal favorite of mine in Shakespeare’s canon, a play about a bad guy doing bad things and getting his comeuppance. Sure maybe Richard III is a profound meditation on the nature of power and evil and malicious ambition, on the other hand maybe that’s actually Macbeth and Richard III is just pure fun. What better play to launch the regime of the great Chicago Shakespeare Theater’s new Artistic Director, Edward Hall, taking over from the great Barbara Gaines by giving us a show with innovative, appropriate and absolutely magical staging and pacing.   All of this is secondary to the Ri